Soul of a Dragon
by Naamah Beherit
Summary: Valka missed her son more and more with each passing year. Therefore, she decided to come back to Berk and see him, even if only from afar. / Based on the movies, genre and rating may change as the story develops. Posted on AO3 as well.
1. Chapter 1

Disclaimer: I don't own HTTYD.

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><p>Valka Haddock was not a sentimental woman, never had been. She was a Viking, therefore being sentimental had not been included in the package she had been given while growing up. She was kind and often calm, though not unable to experience occasional bursts of anger and stubbornness. And yet, for as long as she could remember, she did not feel she could fit in – neither in her parents' tribe nor in the one she had married into. She had earned the right to be called "Valka the Kind", and it had been the cause of quite a few weird looks and hushed whispers she had received in the past. Apparently, a Viking should never have acted in the way that caused him or her to be called "the Kind".<p>

Valka did not care. And, to her amazement, her husband did not mind either.

They had been happy together, she was not afraid to admit that. It was just the details that had sometimes caused them to argue. However, the details had been so fundamental that in the end they had overshadowed all the good. It had taken her quite a few years to notice that – unfortunately, that had happened much later than it should have.

Would she have fought harder against being carried off if the realisation had come sooner? After all those years, she was unable to answer that question even when she asked it herself.

So she had focused on what good she could do for the nest, and while years had passed, she had begun to call it her home. It was a good home, and she was finally able to something she deeply believed was right. It calmed her heart and soothed her thoughts, and made her tired enough to sleep without dreams.

She did not like dreams. In them, she saw people she had left behind and things that could have been.

That was why she had been surprised when thoughts about her son had become more and more frequent with each passing year. It had been unsettling at first, and in time they had become the only things she thought about. She spent every single moment of each and every day on thinking what her little boy could look like, what he liked, and how he was treated. He was a real Viking, no doubt about that, a brave and strong boy that would become a warrior worthy of his family, an heir to make his father proud.

He was where he was supposed to be, she kept telling herself. He was happy.

And yet her heart made her think and wonder, and wishing for things she could not have. For example, she could not go back to Berk and see her Hiccup. The main reason was not even the fact that everyone believed she was dead; she would probably not even show her herself to anyone – she would be glad only to see the boy from the distance, and no one had to notice her presence in the woods.

At least that was what she was telling herself; she was unsure herself is she would be able not to speak to her son once she saw him.

The only way she could go to Berk was with Cloudjumper's help, and that was the thing that frightened her most. Her imagination was providing her with various ways her best friend could be killed by the Hooligans, she alongside him in most cases, and the images were horrifying. She knew there were ways of coming to the island unseen, and hiding in the woods were more than easy, but she still feared they would be seen. She was torn between the need to protect Cloudjumper and the desire to see Hiccup, and that inner fight made her doubt the very principles on which she had built her life for the last years. Surely there was no need to endanger both Cloudjumper and herself, surely the boy was happy...

Her heart – which, as it turned out, was sentimental – kept tugging and hurting every time she tried to reason with herself. It neither listened nor relented; it tortured her as long as it was needed for her to give up.

When she did, it felt both amazing and horrible at the same time. Most of all, she had a nagging feeling of betraying dragons that regarded her as a guarantee of their safety. They did not do anything that would give her a reason for such thoughts, so she thought that it was only her guilt speaking to her – constantly, day after day and night after night. She had accumulated quite an amount of guilt in her life, most of which could easily be explained, but she had learnt to live with it. She had learnt to dumb herself every time her considerable reserves of guilt made her remember, but that... That was new. That was something she did not have time to process, to get used to, and to finally accept. That was something which was going to haunt her thoughts while she was away.

Cloudjumper seemed to understand – he was not thrilled about the prospect of the journey, but did not refuse. Maybe he simply sensed her growing distress and wanted to help – they were friends, after all.

Valka wondered if Hiccup would ever be able to understand that. Her conclusion was depressing, but she forced herself not to care too much about. Instead, she focused on the joy of her journey, on a possibility of seeing her son and – she silently wished – of him understanding her.

If she was courageous enough to approach him at all.

Therefore, almost fifteen years after leaving Berk, Valka was coming back, her head full of buzzing thoughts and impossible hopes, and at the same time clutched tightly in an iron fist of fear.

* * *

><p>Hidden safely in the shadow cast by trees, Hiccup was looking at the village with heavy heart and racing thoughts. His insides were announcing their existence quite constantly and somewhat painfully, and he was sure that it would only get worse. He was supposed to be heading to the ring for just another late night training, and he simply could not force himself to put one feet after another and pretend that he was interested in the dragon training. How could he, after all?<p>

He had always dreamt of having a friend – a single one would suffice – and his dreams had never come true. He was not even aware of how much he craved acceptance and comfort of having someone to confide in, to trust and rely on. He should have been terrified of the fact that he had apparently found that friend in a dragon, but he realised that he did not care. Possible repercussions scared Hiccup out of his wits, but at the same he could not care less what others might think. He found himself on a path of not caring – just as his tribe did not care about him. That destination was still afar, and he was not yet ready to reach it, but foundations of it had been present in his life for quite some time now. They grew with every disappointed scowl and each "Hiccup the Useless" he heard.

They grew enough to make him wonder if maybe life could be better somewhere else. Those thoughts still were only half-formed and thwarted by his sense of duty and the love for his father, but they were getting stronger every day. Recent changes, caused by his success in the ring, were only quickening the process. Although Hiccup knew the Vikings' temperament, he failed to imagine the outrage that would surely break out if the Hooligans knew the reason behind his "way with the beasts".

Hiccup's shoulders slumped as he sighed and began his reluctant way towards the ring. He did not bother to go home and clean himself – Toothless' saliva did not wash out no matter what he tried. He reeked of fish – truth be told, it had recently become a constant – but a distinctive smell of Toothless could also be noticed. Hiccup thought of it as a mixture of warmness and an aroma of moors in the early spring. He hoped that it was strong enough to cause whichever dragon they were going to face to ignore him. He did not have strength to deal with the reptile if it decided to go after him because he smelt like food.

One could dream.

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><p><em>In the years that followed, Hiccup sometimes looked back and tried to determine what exactly had caused the chaos in the ring that night. Time had blurred them all together in his mind, making him remember only singular images, shattered pieces of a complicated set of events.<em>

_There had been Fishlegs and the twins, watching everything from a safe distance. There had been Astrid, furiously running around and trying to find a new weapon, because the handle of her axe had been damaged. There had been the Nadder, aggressively defending itself while fear had been shining in its eyes. And, finally, there had been Snotlout, determined to make the best of his only chance to prove himself._

_Sometimes, during long winter nights, Hiccup would sit with Stormfly and scratch her until she purred, curled happily around him. He tried to use that sound to replace memories of horrified screeches and a gut-wrenching sound of bones being shattered, but to no avail._

_During nights like those, he wished he had been quicker._

* * *

><p>A sound that Snotlout's mace made in contact with the Nadder's wing caused Hiccup's insides to twist and have an attempt at freedom. The dragon screeched and swayed on its feet, its right wing becoming a tangle of broken bones in mere seconds. Snotlout cheered, swung his mace and hit again, causing the reptile to fall down and cower.<p>

"_No!_" Hiccup yelled and ran towards the Nadder. He stopped between it and Snotlout, half-terrified at his own surge of potentially fatal courage. He did not think of consequences, neither did he waste time to imagine what his father's reaction would undoubtedly be. His perception narrowed, allowing his mind to notice only the dragon. His heart broke when the Nadder flinched at his sight, as though it expected him to hurt it as well.

"What the hell are you doing, Hiccup?" Snotlout shouted, his mace dangerously close to Hiccup's face.

"You've done enough," he said. "Now back off."

"Are you mad?!" his cousin's face twisted in confusion, the mace in his hand twitching in rhythm with spasms ravaging his muscles. "You're defending that... that vermin—"

"You can't kill dragons during the training, Snot!" Hiccup said with frustration, his mind frantically trying to come up with rational explanation for his decision. He could physically _feel_ Astrid's gaze on him, and tried his best to ignore it. "If you keep beating it, you'll kill it."

"Good!" Snotlout yelled, spitting all over Hiccup's face. "They don't deserve anything else!"

"Snotlout—"

"Calm down, ya two," Gobber grabbed both teenagers by the necks and shoved them away of each other. "Go home, it's over fer tonight."

"It's not over!" Snotlout screamed at the top of his lungs and threw his mace at the dragon. The Nadder flinched and tried to move further away from the humans. Hiccup's heart gave a painful pang at the sight of that. It reminded him too much of how Toothless behaved when he had been lying on the ground, ropes all over his—

_Stop_, Hiccup told himself.

"Yes, it is, now _get OUT_!" the smith roared. As Gobber's rage was one of those things that children learnt to avoid soon after learning how to walk, the teenagers left the ring in a hurry, muttering between themselves. Hiccup bit back his terror and forced himself to stay. "And what are ya still doin' 'ere?"

"What are you going to do with it?"

"That's no business of yours," Gobber said and pushed the boy towards the exit. Hiccup stubbornly refused to be moved, which cost him all the strength he could muster. "Get. Out. _Now_."

"Let me deal with it," Hiccup almost begged, his words spoken so quickly that they were almost impossible to understand. "We need a Nadder in our training, and there's no way of knowing when we'll be able to catch another one to replace this one. And—and it's just a broken wing, I can build something that'll allow it to heal, and—"

"Hiccup..." Gobber said, his voice full of annoyance.

"Gobber, just _look _at it," the boy pleaded, all pretence gone from his voice and posture. The Nadder whimpered behind him. "No one deserves to be treated like this. Not even a dragon. Let me take care of it and you won't even have to come close to it."

The smith stood silent for a moment, looking at him in a way Hiccup had never seen before. It made the boy feel uneasy. He was used to being looked down upon, scolded or ignored, but that look... It felt as if Gobber wanted to see into his very soul, and Hiccup was quite certain the results would not make him happy.

"Just like yer mother, arent' ya," the smith quietly said and sighed, his shoulders sagging. Hiccup looked at him, startled beyond belief. Out of many possible reactions he was expecting of Gobber, that was definitely not one of them. It made him be at a loss to an extent he did not believe possible. "Very well, do what you want, I don't care about the beast. But mark my words, lad: if it starts making trouble, you lot won't have to worry 'bout fightin' the Nadders until yer first raid."

As Gobber headed for the exit, Hiccup was entirely sure that his quiet 'Thank you' was left purposely unheard.


	2. Chapter 2

When Astrid came to the smithy looking for him, Hiccup had already been working since dawn. With Toothless' tail fin already perfected and ready for a test flight, it was possible for him to focus on a sling for the Nadder. His teeth gritted on their own accord every time the dragon came to his mind. His own fierce reaction amazed Hiccup and begged for careful consideration, but he filed that for an unspecified later. He had neither time nor strength to deal with that, not to mention that thinking about possible consequences made him sick.

So he hammered on, wishing that it would help him forget at least temporarily. He kept reminding himself not to think about the Nadder, and those repeated thoughts had become a mantra in his mind, one that saved him from facing reality just a little bit longer.

It was quite difficult for Astrid to shake him out of it, and that did not improve her temper.

"Ah... Astrid!" he stammered, composing himself under her judging gaze. She was furious, and it was partially his fault. "What are you doing here?"

She handed him her axe, and he almost fell over under its weight. "I need it fixed," she simply said. Hiccup had to bit his tongue to avoid commenting the sheer politeness of her request.

"All right," he said instead and got to work without further ado. "Do you want to wait or shall I—"

"I'll wait," she cut him in.

"This is going to take a while."

"I'll wait," she repeated. Hiccup risked a glance at her and was surprised to see that she looked conflicted. Her whole posture seemed to radiate uneasiness and confusion, but he had an impression that it did not lessen her fierce temperament, neither did it make her any less dangerous. All of a sudden, he tried to imagine her as someone else than a warrior and failed miserably.

"Suit yourself," he shrugged and promised himself to keep his mouth shut. It was always better not to antagonise her, and he opted for being extra careful at the moment. Astrid was quiet for a while, but it did not take long for her to get restless. She began pacing around the forge with no other purpose of her action but to kill time. Under normal circumstances, Hiccup would have muttered 'I told you so,', but those were not normal circumstances. She never stayed longer than necessary in the smithy, but he treasured those moments nonetheless. Every single time that happened, he wished he was able to at least talk to her without making a fool of himself. He wished she treated him like an equal. He wished she spoke with him not only when she needed something repaired. He wished he did not feel as if he were invisible while being in her presence.

He wished for things he could not have.

"What's that?" Astrid asked, and he was thankful for having an excuse to look at her. She was holding one of the early versions of Toothless' tail fin, which Hiccup stored to melt and use again later.

His heart, already pounding too rapidly, quickened even more at the sight of the fin. "Uhm..." he mumbled, his mind hastily searching for a plausible explanation. "That's a... personal project of mine. A failed personal project. I need to strip it apart."

"Your 'personal projects' are just as weird as you are," Astrid huffed and put the fin away. Hiccup silently promised himself to thank Odin for that. Later, though, with proper offerings and all that.

"Well," he shrugged, trying to come up with a subject he could talk to her about. "We all have to do something in our free time, don't we? You kill trees, and I..." _have a dragon friend,_ he thought, "tinker."

"I _practise_," she said in a voice that could freeze entire Berk.

Hiccup raised a brow, suddenly feeling cheeky. "On targets that don't move?" he asked. "Come on, you could do better than that."

"I _was_ doing better than that!" she yelled, and he mentally cursed himself for going too far. He would be lucky if she did not break anything of his. "Then... then suddenly every dragon starts acting like a puppy around you, and there's no training anymore, just... just you showing off and making them behave like pets!"

Hiccup stared at her, all words and thoughts gone from his mind, and Astrid's axe long but forgotten. Was she, Astrid Hofferson, the most promising warrior of their generation, jealous? Of _him_? He was Hiccup the Useless, the village nuisance, his status of an heir to the chief somehow forgotten amidst everything he had done. He had never avoided taking responsibility for something that had been his fault and had never complained, not once. Not openly. He would have never done that to his father.

And he was not even _fighting_ the dragons, so what was the cause of her jealousy? Everyone knew she was the best.

Astrid. Jealous. Hiccup could not wrap his head around it.

"Well, I can't help that they come after me," he said slowly, carefully weighing his words. "And when they do, I do my best to stay alive."

What he thought to be a polite and reasonable answer, only made Astrid mad. "And how do you even do that?!" she yelled, and he involuntarily took a step back. "You don't fight them and yet they crawl around you like a bunch of pups!"

Hiccup swallowed with difficulty, his dry throat refusing to cooperate. It was a dangerous territory their conversation was heading into. One that could cost him what was most precious to him. "I just figured out a few tricks, you know. Something that would keep me alive. I can't say my life is wonderful, but I don't want to lose it."

"Tricks!" Astrid repeated in frustration. She approached Hiccup and poked him in the chest. Hard. As hard as only she could. "There is no honour in tricks!"

"As long as they keep me alive," he shrugged, restraining himself from rubbing a sore spot left by her finger. A sliver of annoyance formed inside him as well. "And you know what? If I have to earn my honour by killing a living being, I don't think it's worth it. I see no honour in pointless killing, regardless if it's a human or a dragon."

She repeatedly opened and closed her mouth a couple of times, struck speechless by his words. There he was, contradicting every single one of her beliefs and questioning the very foundations of their society. He was surprised a bit as well, for he had never objected so openly before. He had always bottled up such thoughts, allowed them to grow and nag at him, causing restless nights and dull days. To voice his thoughts would mean facing his father's disappointed scowls, and that was something Hiccup passionately wanted to avoid. It always pained him to cause his father disappointment by nothing more but his mere existence. He deeply craved acceptance and never managed to achieve it. He wanted to please his father and that desire was never fulfilled.

Now, when he partially voiced his profoundly hidden thoughts and hurt feelings, a realisation hit him. Maybe there was nothing wrong with him – maybe it was something about _them._

"This..." Astrid hesitated and shook her head. "This is insane. There's no honour in pointless killing?! Tell that to the families of those who were killed by dragons. Tell that to their children! Odin's beard, tell that to _yourself!_"

Hiccup blinked a few times, unsure of what she had in mind. Then it sank in and his mild annoyance turned into anger. "You leave my mother out of this," he said in a cold voice. There was no count of how many times he had already tortured himself over that.

Every time he met a dragon and did not hate it, every time he had an opportunity to hurt it and did not do that, Hiccup's already confused mind and doubtful heart became more and more heavy. It felt like a betrayal and he could not work that out by himself. How could he betray a woman that was dead? A woman he did not remember? Most of the time, he felt nothing when he thought of her. He used to wonder what it would have been like if his mother had been alive, but he stopped doing that a long time ago. There was no point in that, for it had always brought him nothing but misery. But now, when he did not need that unrealistic dreams anymore, thoughts about his mother suddenly started haunting him again.

Should he honour her memory by winning the training? Would she want that? Was she 'a good Viking'?

He did not know. Truth be told, he did not know anything about his mother. Maybe that was the reason why he kept thinking about Gobber's words. Maybe he should ask his father about it.

If his father were willing to talk to him at all.

"Then start acting like a Viking!" Astrid yelled. Her voice managed to catch attention of a few passers-by, and Hiccup grimaced at the amount of gossip that was surely going to appear because of their quarrel. Admittedly, he should have led her to his study as soon as it had become obvious that an argument was inevitable. However, with all the drawings of Toothless and designs of his tail fin scattered all over that tiny room, it would have probably been the worst decision in Hiccup's life.

"What I act like is my own business, not yours," he growled, trying to keep his voice down. Some part of him was wriggling in an iron grasp of misery. Why did they _always_ have to quarrel? Why was it impossible for them to have a normal relationship?

"It _is_ mine in the ring!" she shouted, seemingly oblivious to the group of villagers that began to gather outside the smithy. "I fight for my honour and a good name of my family, and _you get in the way!_"

That was something he was familiar with far better than he would have liked. He always got in the way. This time, somehow, it struck more painfully that any of the previous ones. Maybe it happened because it was _her_ who told him that. Or maybe it was simply the last straw.

He needed to go out there and keep flying until he could lie to himself that it stopped hurting.

"You know what?" he said in a falsely cheerful tone. "You can win the training, I don't care. Just don't expect me to do nothing if the dragons come after me. Now if you'll excuse me, I have to repair your axe. I'll have it brought to you when it's done."

She possibly wanted to retort, but he purposely turned away from her and picked up the forgotten axe. He heard her storming out of the smithy and tried to pretend that his heart did not just break into pieces.

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><p>Everything was irrelevant – his worries and fears and obligation caused by his father's departure. Astrid's axe lay in the smithy, unfinished and forgotten – it did not matter. There was a training session happening right at that moment – he did not care, neither about his absence nor about possible repercussions he might face.<p>

Hiccup and Toothless were flying, and nothing else mattered.

Not even the fact that they had almost died a while ago and Hiccup promised himself not to get cocky. At least not now. Maybe later, when he and Toothless got used to each other.

There was definitely going to be a 'later'. Having discovered what it was like to fly, Hiccup was not going to give it up. Having found something that made him happy, he was going to fight to keep it.

Having made a friend, Hiccup was going to protect Toothless as best as he could. Struck by a sudden pang of an undefined feeling that he could describe only as strangely warm, he scratched the Fury's head, receiving a contented growl in return.

_I have befriended a dragon_, he told himself again, curious to see if that sentence lost its astonishing vibe. As it turned out, it did not. Every time he thought about that, it felt equally bizarre.

The dragon in question did not seem to mind having befriended a human either.

Conditions were perfect for flying – such a cloudless sky had not been seen in a long while. Hiccup did not know that so much could be seen from above. They had to maintain a high altitude to avoid being spotted from the ground so the temperature was significantly lower, but Hiccup did not mind. When it was possible to experience something so wonderful, a little bit o chilly air became insignificant.

All of a sudden, he tried to imagine the look on

_(Astrid's)_

everyone's faces if they saw him. His imagination, which was usually so vivid, failed him, causing merely a fit of laughter. Toothless looked back at him with one of those goofy expressions of his – Hiccup settled for believing that it was amusement and a little bit of interest this time – and let out a happy roar. Hiccup could not help but smile, feeling utterly carefree. Here and now, nothing mattered. Here and now, his heart was light, whole and unscarred.

Sunset was already near when he heard a faint echo of an unspecified sound being carried over the sea. Toothless growled, suddenly alert, and it was enough to set Hiccup's nerves on edge as well. He was not stupid to dismiss the Fury's reaction.

"What is it, bud?" he asked, his words almost unrecognisable because of his cold lips. He had to make himself a helmet.

Toothless growled again and changed course – now, instead of their previous destination, they were heading back to Berk. It was not exactly the place Hiccup wanted to see

_(anymore)_

right now – he did hope for a longer flight – but he did not argue. Whatever caught Toothless' attention, Hiccup realised he should investigate. With his absent father, he should be the one to take care of the village, and that meant finding out about possible threats.

_Not that anyone would ever listen to me_, he thought, bitterness creeping into his thoughts. He did not delude himself that their sudden affection towards him would last forever. Nothing good ever did.

Toothless unexpectedly jolted upwards, flying almost vertically towards the clouds above then. Hiccup gripped the saddle and flattened himself on the dragon's back as much as he could. He had already found out what it was like to slip off the saddle. Experiencing that once was enough for one day.

They were flying in circles for a while, slowly and quietly, with nothing but clouds around them. Hiccup had no idea what Toothless was looking for, but the golden light of the setting Sun made him wish that the dragon found it quickly. It was getting colder with each passing minute and the air had that particular taste of an approaching snowstorm. The winter would probably come sooner than expected. Hiccup's mind involuntarily busied itself with thoughts about the village. His father should be there now, making sure they were prepared and well-stocked for the months to come. Instead, he was somewhere at sea, chasing ghosts of impossible assumptions and misplaced priorities.

A sudden surge of anger clouded Hiccup's thoughts. Anger, which was directed at his father and, at the same time, no one in particular. He did feel like that a lot lately, and it was a state of mind he was not overly fond of.

Toothless' soft growl brought Hiccup back to reality. It sounded... concerned, even worried, and that caused a strong pang of affection in him. He reached out and a placed a hand on the dragon's head. "I'm fine, bud," he said with a smile, his voice quiet and calm. "I'm fine. Did you find whatever you were looking for?"

The Night Fury growled again and slowly approached the clouds' edge. Hiccup looked down, confused and unsure whether he would see anything. His worries were justified – there was nothing else but trees and a couple of hills down there. Not a single detail could be made out on this altitude. Hiccup was not sure, but he suspected that those hills were the ones he used to climb when he was a child. They were not steep, but their height was considerable – and yet they looked like mere rocks from above.

"There's nothing, bud," he said. "Are you sure there's anything to look for?"

Toothless groaned and jerked his head to the left. Hiccup looked again in that direction, taking in all the trees and hills and—

He froze, coldness and anger forgotten as though they were never there. Something was _moving_ above the sea, appearing and disappearing behind the cliffs, something big enough to be seen even from here. It was a mere silhouette, a shadow on the surface of the cliffs, but it could be seen nonetheless. And with the way it moved...

"Thor almighty," Hiccup whispered. He had a feeling that his blood froze. "It's a dragon."


End file.
